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How Vulnerable Are Your Customers (part 2)
In my previous blog post I described the current situation: Now more than ever, your customers are being bombarded by competitive offers and even some of your most loyal customers are actually listening to your competitors. Your customers are vulnerable. What can you do about it? First, you have to understand, “Who are your best…
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How Vulnerable Are Your Customers?
How many of your customers are being bombarded by your competitors? How many are now seriously considering your competitors’ offers? Last week alone my daughter received more than 20 solicitations from colleges and universities around the country. Some are creative, some are boring, some are promising a great education and others seem to be promising…
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“Firing” Customers–the AmEx Way
How do you “fire” your most unprofitable customers? American Express is offering a$300 prepaid American Express gift card to entice select cardholders to pick up their marbles and go home. Cardholders with high balances and little to no spending or payment activity have been identified as high risks, particularly now as card issuers prepare to…
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Are You Sacrificing Loyalty for Short-Term Profits?
How often do you make a change that you’re just sure that customers are going to love and are met with dead silence? Or worse, vociferous complaints? Today’s Wall Street Journal reports that US Airways is reversing its decision to charge for water and soda, saying that the customer backlash is overshadowing efforts to highlight…
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Here’s a Quarter, Call Someone Who Cares
Some time ago there was a Country & Western song entitled, “Here’s a quarter, call someone who cares.” I don’t remember the lyrics or even who sang it, but this is the new catchphrase for United Airlines. In last week’s Wall Street Journal it was announced that United is dropping an Indian customer-call center that…
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Sued because of a bad customer experience
This morning I had a rare opportunity to sit down at the breakfast table with my 17 year old daughter and catch up, just the two of us before anyone else awoke. She surprised me with her perception of what makes a good customer experience! She told me of her experience in trying to find…
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Google’s New Latitude Has Some Scratching their Heads–Brilliant I say!
This week, Google announced their new Latitude software that finds and tracks people by using GPS systems and cell tower triangulation. It also uses Google’s mapping software for mobile phones. It is billed as a way to keep track of your friends and to let your friends keep track of you, ala the twitter microblogs…
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Consumers are Trading Downwards
As I’ve mentioned before, there are a number of indicators that during this recession customers are trading downwards. What can you do to align yourself with this trend? If you look closely, you’ll see how you can take advantage of it so that you do two things: keep your low-end customers from trading down to…
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If you scare customers away, will they ever return?
I was reading some research conducted by Harris in 2007 and published by RightNow that said that, “ 80% of respondents said they would never return to an organization after a poor customer experience.” Clearly those surveyed were consumers with a plethora of options available to them such that they could afford to be so…